I've had anxiety problems for a couple months now. It started when I was trying to fall asleep one night and I had a mild panic attack and ended up in the ER. I haven't had a full blown panic attack since then, but anxiety problems have been on my mind.

I'm a 21 year old male, with a history of anxiety in my family (father and sister both on paxil, both doing much better). I'd classify my problems as mild to moderate, but probably getting worse. Physically the only problems I have are uneasy stomach, hot flashes, the "electric shock" feeling in my hands and feet, and some sleeping problems. What really bothers me is the fact that I'm ALWAYS thinking about anxiety whether I'm sitting on my couch or out at the mall or wherever I might be. It's the worst when I'm alone and bored. The only time I don't think about it is when I'm busy doing something (i.e. cooking, cleaning, doing schoolwork), but it's impossible to keep busy all the time obviously. It's really starting to get annoying and negatively affect my life. I'm trying the different self-help techniques with little success.

I'm thinking about going on some sort of medication because I can't get rid of my anxiety over anxiety (that probably sounds weird, but there's really no triggers for the anxiety, it's just always there for no reason really.) I'm not really depressed (I've got great friends and a great family, doing well in college, bright future ahead of me), but i'm afraid I could be in the future if I keep feeling like this.

Does it sound like medication would be helpful for me? Everything I've read says anxiety is easiest to contain/cure when it is dealt with early on, so I want to do something soon. Let me know what you think, I wanna do something before it gets worse! (Sorry for being so long :tongue: )

Your research serves you well. It is correct that early treatment to "nip it in the bud" is the easiest way to contain it. Those of my patients with Panic Disorder who have been able to beat it did so because they started treatment early, or they had to learn some fairly counterintuitive cognitive techniques along with medicine.

I think you should definitely see your physician about treatment for anxiety. Anxiety is one of the more difficult types of problems to have, simply because patients often have no idea why they are anxious. If you don't know why you're anxious, then how can you fix the problem, short of shelling out money and time for psychoanalysis?

I'm not sure what happened yesterday, but I posted a response and it somehow got lost through the internet. I'm hoping this gets to you this time.

I hope you take the advice posted already and speak with your doctor/psychiatrist about your anxiety. You are correct that anxiety can get worse overtime if not dealt with early.

There are some very good medications out there that can help you with this, or....maybe through therapy you can find ways to keep this under control.

As a therapist, my first thought is, "what caused the anxiety attack the night you ended up in the ER?". If you know, then maybe that is something you would want to work on with a therapist since it seems that incident was the catalyst in your anxiety problems since. If not, a therapist might be able to help you figure out what your attack was all about and go from there.

Either way, I really recommend speaking with your doctor/psychiatrist to help you in the mean time. It's never fun to have a panic attack.